CPB Awards American History And Civics Initiative Grants

July 12, 2007

Last Friday, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting announced grants to seven content creator/public television station partnerships as part of its groundbreaking American History and Civics Initiative.

Launched in 2005, the initiative calls upon the country's public television managers, filmmakers, and content developers—especially in the high technology and interactive media sector—to join educators in creating groundbreaking media projects and methods that measurably improve the learning of American history and civics by middle and high school students.

"For too long, young people's knowledge of American history and civics has been on the decline," said Patricia Harrison, CPB president and CEO. "Public broadcasting is in a unique position, along with our partners, to reach this audience through their cell phones, TVs, iPods, computers, or other technologies to deliver meaningful, educational content they will use throughout their lives."

The grants, which range from $400,000 to $900,000, will allow partnerships to do further research and development as well as create and test a prototype or pilot of the projects. A second round of grants will be awarded for the implementation and production of those projects deemed most likely to measurably improve student learning of history and civics after research and development and/or prototype testing.

Seven projects were selected for the American History and Civics Initiative, including web-based games, a reality TV show and a show based on the popular PBS series History Detectives. WGBH in Boston, MA, will be the initiative manager on these projects, most of which will be implemented in 2009.

For more information visit the Corporation for Public Broadcasting at www.cpb.org.